


Things to Tell (Another Time)

by Vee (Mlle_Vee)



Series: Things to Tell [2]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-10
Updated: 2014-01-10
Packaged: 2018-01-08 07:13:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1129824
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mlle_Vee/pseuds/Vee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>On Alderaan, Leia has questions for Padmé.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Things to Tell (Another Time)

**Author's Note:**

> First published May 1, 2002.

Mother's hands moved slowly. This was not difficult for anyone to notice, but it struck Leia as profound. She did not seem beaten, just a bit gaunt at first, but as the substandard health of imprisonment faded and was replaced with an almost-exuberance, you could hardly point her out as the same woman she'd been in the Great Hall, shocked silent, biting her lip.

She hadn't said anything really, just watched Leia eat breakfast as if she were monitoring the movements of some great phenomenon, quasars, stars exploding. She had wished her good luck that first morning—a speech had long been scheduled, as part of Leia's run for Senate—and shyly took her second hug in years from her daughter. Leia had invited her along, but Mother had to refuse.

Leia wanted to know what it was that made her mother so high-profile that she couldn't slip into a crowd. She'd asked Mother and Father (the words, their meanings, they didn't change; Saché was Mother, Padmé was Mother) and they said that she would tell her someday, when she was ready, and it was not their place. She had pursed her lips and fought saying what she was thinking. Mother's hands moved delicately, too, not as if she were too fragile to grip anything, but as if she were afraid to destroy things. Leia thought she could tell what she was doing, as if it were the edge of a secret: Mother didn't want to leave a print on the galaxy. Leia did. With her mother here, for the first time, she began to think of her birth father. If Mother didn't want to affect the galaxy, just wanted to be a simple handmaiden in service to her Queen, then perhaps it was her father who had been ambitious.

Leia didn't ask these things. The things she did ask were delicate, too: favorite songs, places she'd been. Mother had lived briefly on Coruscant, but hadn't liked it at all. "Better to be imprisoned on Naboo than free on Coruscant," Mother had joked, then sobered quickly. Jokes were not yet comfortable. Mother's fingernails were perfect, and danced just along the edge of a table. Her hair was not out of place at all; there seemed to be twist to the sections of the braids. Leia understood the old word "covet." In that stretched time, she asked Mother to braid her own hair.

"A bit simpler than yours," she amended.

Mother didn't seem to mind at all. They sat on the floor. Those slow hands worked magic, the way they sectioned hair. Mother was quiet still, as she had been. "I remember your hair liked to go this way," she said, upon reaching a section that had never liked to do what Leia had told it to, her voice as if she was in some sacred place, quiet. Mother looked around her hands, and Leia turned to see why she had stopped. "Do you remember?"

"Remember what?"

"When I'd let you play with the things in my trunk."

Of course Leia remembered. It was a treasure trove, a grand toy box. She and Mother would transform each other with facepaint in dazzling bright colors and Mother would smile. And then the last time, when she'd been reaching for a dress she wasn't allowed to play with, and suddenly the two women she called Mother had shut the lid on her—

"Yes."

Mother's eyes lost the distance and began braiding again.

"Why did you ask?"

Mother finished grandly, had managed to not need ties to make the braid hold. "I was just curious to see. You're very different now."

"And you wanted assurance that I am the same?"

"Astute. Yes."

Leia stood, smoothed the skirt of her dress carefully, and offered her mother a hand up. "Sometimes I want that, too, about you."

Mother didn't seem to know what to say. "It's another time," she finally said, forcing a smile, "and that's what it waits for."


End file.
